“Many nurses have expressed appreciation for the generous wage increases Sharp has offered, and they are showing their commitment by planning not to honor the strike and be at work on Monday,” Dan Gross, Sharp Healthcare’s executive vice president, said Friday night. “For these nurses, patients come first.”

Focus of the negotiations pivoted Friday to whether or not Sharp nurses should be compelled to join the union, or be fired for not paying union dues.

“Paying union dues should be an issue of individual freedom and choice, not an organizational mandate,” Gross said.

“By putting their fervent desire for a closed shop, and the revenue additional union dues would generate, over and above being at the bedside for patients, SPNN/UNAC is making a powerful statement about what matters most to them.”

The nurses intend to return to work Thursday. The union delivered the required 10-day notice to the hospital chain’s management on Nov. 17, a week after 98 percent of around 2,200 Sharp nurses who cast ballots rejected the company’s latest bargaining offer.

— City News Service

Sharp Healthcare to Replace Nurses on Strike With Substitutes was last modified: November 26th, 2016 by Cassia Pollock

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